Restoring an architectural gem? Keeping an old home together? Need cost-effective tricks to save old windows, reuse salvage materials, find space for another purpose?

Meet the people with the know-how at the House Restoration Fair, Saturday March 27^th from 10 am to 2pm. The Fair will take place at the Buffalo and Erie County Historical Society Museum located at 25 Nottingham Court at Elmwood Avenue, Buffalo. General admission is $8, or $6 if you’re a Historical Society member.

Speak with craftsmen, artisans, material suppliers, and contractors at display tables AND see presentations of first-hand experiences from a carpenter, homeowners, and architects. We’ll be there….will you??

A big thanks to Shea’s Buffalo for being the venue, Join us, JANUARY 24th, 2010!
You were there when the Hero Family was announced, You were there when Buffalo ReUse performed the Green Demolition, You were there when volunteers from PUSH and Re-Tree WNY built the community gardens, You were there when Americorps and others descended on the block and over 70 houses in the neighborhood got a facelift, You were there when David Homes built the brand new house!…Now you can be there as all of Buffalo celebrates the national spotlight! On behalf of PUSH Buffalo, Buffalo ReUse, Re-Tree WNY, and WNY Americorps, as well as The Powell Family–we hope you will join us all.

Doors open at 7pm Folks can meet The Powell Family, mingle, and learn about the ways they can volunteer and contribute to future neighborhood improvements. Channel 7 (WKBW) will feature a documentary of behind-the-scenes footage of the 106 hours of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition while the cast, volunteers, and neighborhood worked around the clock. Finally, from 8-10pm ABC will broadcast the Special Buffalo Episode and we’ll all watch together as the story unfolds.

We hope that everyone will come and celebrate the national spotlight on Buffalo and the neighborhood revitalization igniting across The Queen City!

TICKETS:  Tickets will be available on Friday, January 15th. All tickets will be distributed in advance of the evening’s events.  Tickets to be obtained from Shea’s Box Office. Tickets are complimentary, limit of 2 per person. No tickets at the door, unless they are still available.

The Shea’s Box Office is located at 650 Main Street and is open  M-F 10 a – 5 p.m. and Saturdays from 10 am– 2 pm   Event Parking is available on Pearl Street, Washington St. etc.

**This event is on FACEBOOK. Please, invite all your friends!!

ATTENTION: Architects, Green Builders, Artists & Designers
Buffalo ReUse is assembling a working group to brainstorm, research, and explore the feasibility of a new, innovative building and reuse idea.  Imagine real Green Housing and Neighborhoods in Buffalo.
If you have an interest in green building, architectural design, interior design–particularly with reused building materials, please join us. We also need folks with knowledge of alternative heating systems, alternative building materials, and residential building codes.

We welcome those of you who have an interest in brainstorming and working on a very out-of-the-box building reuse, rehabilitation, and eco-friendly project with a unique twist.  We will hold an introductory meeting to overview the intention of the project on Monday, January 11th at 6:30 p.m. at 158 Eaton Street.

If you are unable to attend, but would like to be included in the email group to receive updates for future meetings please send a short interest email to rehome {at} buffaloreuse(.)org

ABC’s hit show “Extreme Makeover Home Edition” is coming to the Queen City! This exciting opportunity brings with it the chance to use the momentum gained by the national spotlight to fuel the revitalization of an entire neighborhood in the matter of days. You have the opportunity to improve not only one family’s life, but the entire surrounding community. This will be a great chance to show that Buffalo really is the City of Good Neighbors.

David Homes  is designing and building an environmentally friendly home starting November 7th and lasting for one week. To sign up as a helping hand, go to http://www.davidhomesextreme.com/. They will need help with Food, Non-Skilled Construction Labor, Check-In, Media, Hospitality, Parking, Trash, Traffic, Barricades, Loading and much more. Join the Buffalo ReUse staff in this unique service experience!

As the weather turns colder, we will be working in the gardens less and less. Buffalo ReUse is switching our focus to the house we are rehabbing. The upstairs currently holds our offices, and the downstairs – eventually – will be our Community Space. The vision is for the first floor to be a space where church groups, women’s groups, boy scouts, etc can gather and hold meetings. There will be a computer with internet access, a copy machine, and a DIY book lending library, to mention a few things. HOWEVER, this house still needs LOTS of work, and that is why we need YOU.

As part of our community programming, we hold free workshops on gardening and home repair every week.  The home repair workshops are usually modeled around what needs to be done in the house at the time. Past workshops include: DryLoking the Basement Walls, Installing Insulation, Tiling the Bathroom Floor, and ReFinishing Stairs. We are asking for volunteers to :

1.) Lead workshops. If you are a handyman and can help us repair holes in our drywall or reglaze our windows or any other home repairs, please let us know. We will arrange a day and time for your workshop which will be advertised on our monthly calendar.

2.) Attend workshops! If you are not so handy but are willing to help us out, please come to one or two of our workshops. We learn as we go along, so most of the time we may be pretty clueless too. But the more the merrier, and then you can bring your new-found skills back to your own home.

Contact volunteer {at} buffaloreuse(.)org if you would like to host a workshop or participate in one. Our monthly calendar of free workshops can always be found on our website.

There’s a buzz in Buffalo–snickering and whispering and “What Iffing” because of the Swinger’s Convention up in the Falls–4 days of hanky panky.  I sure hope they stay hydrated!  I’ve actually wanted to write about swinging for a long time and now that the events at the Holiday Inn are smoldering in people’s minds–I couldn’t hold back.  Can I tell you a secret?  I actually know some folks in Buffalo who started a very special key party of their own!  This group of couples have an assortment of skills and they share them with each other different nights and weekends as their schedules allow.  When I first heard about it I wanted to blab to everyone, but then they cautioned me to be discrete because they want to keep it somewhat exclusive.

It’s not scandalous or anything, but Peter & Tamara swap… houses!  Yep, they do–with 2 other couples on Manchester Place.  They created a small network of neighbors who’ve learned some home improvement skills and they go over to each others’ houses as a group and tackle those respective Honey-Do lists like painting the kitchen, tiling the bathroom or installing cabinets or ripping out carpet.  Of course, they open a bottle of wine and they order chinese or a pizza and make an evening of it.  It’s not controversial, it’s not even risque’ (drat.)  I am sure it happens in kitchens and baths all over America–or at least I hope it does! Peter says he loves it–”doing chores with friends makes for light work.”  They rotate the houses and tasks–one weeknight a month.

It’s just an idea–go ahead and start fantasizing about what you can get done in your house with intimate friends–why else are you staying up in middle of the night watching all those DIY videos and that HGTV on cable?  If you don’t have any skills in that department we can certainly help you, since we have those types of free workshops all the time.
As you’re writing your holiday cards and thinking about gifts for your friends and neighbors who you’ll stand next to at the eggnog bowl this season . . . Why don’t you take a risk?  Raise a few eyebrows by suggesting a key party–ReUse style!
I bet you’ll get some takers.

Michael-John Bailie, Paul Dudkowski, Ernest Ng H.H. and Dan Stripp would like to invite all to attend a viewing of Quad Space Saturday, Oct 17th between 12-5pm. The House is located at 139 Howell St, Buffalo, NY 14207.

Quad Space is an insertion of an architectural academic exercise as a full-scale constructed exploration to spatially and structurally manipulate and define the division of four spaces within a 400 sqf house. This collaborative thesis project is strengthened and necessitated by the nature, scale and logistics of a full scale architectural construction exercise involving coordination, compromises and negotiations by four individuals, while also being challenged and contorted by the conventions of the academia and its definition of a thesis work as a purely individual exercise.

This thesis acknowledges and provokes the typical American view of domesticity by challenging the perception of conventionally extensive spatial needs within the ideal American home and domestic landscape, by redefining and reinterpreting conventional building codes requirements for minimal living.

Project: Quad Space
Authors: Michael-John Bailie, Paul Dudkowski, Ernest Ng H.H., Dan Stripp
Thesis Committee: Professor Mehrdad Hadighi (Committee chair), Dr Jean La Marche, Professor Annette LeCuyer, Jose Chang
Institution: University at Buffalo, Department of Architecture
Contributors: Blackrock Neigborhood Housing Works, Alp Steel Corp., J.W. Danforth, CIR Electrical Construction Corp, Wendel Duchscherer Architects

Part Eight of a Series

This series of informational blog posts come from a document Mike,Caesandra and Kevin created to help orient new Buffalo ReUse board members to our mission,vision,values and the actual history of our organization. Earlier parts: One Two Three Four Five Six Seven

The ReSource is Access. It is an open door to affordable, high quality building materials and a support system for home owners. Buffalo ReUse’s ReSource is our retail destination for high quality building materials, environmental education and community activism. The store is located in Buffalo’s midtown, at 298 Northampton Street. It is nestled right on the border of the Masten Park & Cold Spring neighborhoods. It is just around the corner from Canisius College, Art Space, the Merriweather Library and the newly restored Packard Building Apartments.

As part of our mission aimed at regenerating neighborhoods and empowering communities, the ReSource functions as our largest point of contact with the public. We serve predominantly an East Side customer base, but attract people from all over WNY and nearby Ontario.

All day long, we sell high-quality building materials at very low prices–including many items which are rare or one-of-a-kind. Our prices and materials help people at all income levels stabilize and improve their homes. We also spend a great deal of time engaging in lively conversations with everyone who calls on the phone or comes into the store. We’re constantly connecting customers and local residents with Buffalo ReUse community programs, with each other, and with other resources they need and with government services.
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OVERVIEW, HISTORY, and PROGRAMS

Part One of a Series

This series of informational blog posts come from a document Mike,Caesandra and Kevin created to help orient new Buffalo ReUse board members to our mission,vision,values and the actual history of our organization. The first part was written by Mike.

When we conceived of Buffalo ReUse, I’ll be honest, not many of our meetings were spent talking about how exciting it would be to demolish houses in the City of Buffalo. However, we were very aware of the scope and complexity of the problem before us and that given the current state of our City, demolition was inevitable. Architectural giants created the community landscape for a City that once prospered. Thousands of vacant houses now stand in place of what were, at one point, vibrant neighborhoods and bustling city streets.

What we did get excited about was how green demolition (a recently developed term, now being used in place of deconstruction), could be used as a vehicle to strengthen our neighborhoods, train young people, and create communities that welcomed people back to the inner city. Not until we have livable communities, free from blight, crime, and fear, will we curb the cycle of decline Buffalo has experienced since the 1950′s. Other cities have experienced this Renaissance.

Unfortunately, one of the unintended consequences has been that earlier residents have been forced out of the inner city, displaced by high value condominiums, rampant development, and a lack of respect for the communities that preceded the reinvestment and growth spurt. Gentrification can be viewed first hand in Boston, MA (my home prior to Buffalo) where low-income folks have been pushed out to the second ring suburban communities of Lynn and Salem, having no choice but to spend an hour or more on the train each day to get to their jobs in the inner-city.

You may wonder what all of this has to do with Buffalo ReUse? If we are to achieve our mission, we must understand the forces at play and we must be prepared to support community development and the growth of our City in a way that is sustainable and respects the residents who now live in each neighborhood.

This is achieved through education and empowerment; access and opportunity; strategic planning and organizing; and then ultimately ACTION. Buffalo ReUse is a “can-do, hands-on” organization. We discuss and evaluate, brainstorm and plan, and then we DO. Our mantra is “Dream It, Do It!”, and we’re where we are today because we’ve forged forward with clear expectations, intentions, and values.

more to come . . .

Dave Majewski and his crew are eatin’ the rain over on the West Side:

1.25″ of rain today in about 30 minutes. Almost zero stormwater runoff from our lot!

Appx. 65 gals of rain filled in to the 3 barrels you see way in back.
Rain garden taking roof runoff from neighbor. Our street ROW bio-retention was sucking in as much storm water as possible and cleaning it!! The extensive composting and mulching we did on the site is really sucking up massive amounts of rain water and retaining it in the soil.
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